Case Studies

Inspirato

Background

When Denver-based Inspirato, a private vacation club, contacted their members with trip proposals, the sales team had to do so by manually sending individual emails. This slow and tedious process, lacking in any real tracking capabilities, was ready to be overhauled, which is where Spire Digital stepped in with a custom solution. In five months, Spire developed a new email marketing tool for Inspirato that was efficient, consistent and measurable, and able to extend to prospects what had once been a sales tool used only for members.

Goal

Inspirato knew their old Request for Proposal email system was problematic in a variety of ways. So the plan became to utilize existing technologies already in place at Inspirato, and leverage Salesforce as a platform to track measurability. Inspirato also needed an email template that could be consistently branded and flexible enough for the sales team to accommodate a diversity of clients speaking several languages, all within an August-December turnaround.

Approach

Spire’s research and discovery started with one-on-one shadowing and interviews with Inspirato’s sales team and stakeholders to understand “a day in the life” of the proposal process. The collaboration deepened through on-site working sessions—even periodically trading employees and office locations with each other. This embedded approach gave Spire unique insight into Inspirato and their customers, and directly impacted the user experience design. For the build, Spire partnered with Inspirato’s product team and worked within their .Net and Angular app stack. The tool integrates with Inspirato’s existing Salesforce platform through Cloud Elements to create a standardized and tracked marketing email delivery. Spire leveraged ExactTarget and SendGrid (another local firm) for email delivery as well. And to increase adoption, Spire kept the user interface in line with Inspirato’s brand.

Solution

Six months after launch, 93% of Inspirato’s trip proposals are now being sent using the new and completely custom RFP email tool and web application. The tool shows a percent-complete workflow as each proposal and selected recipients are crossed off. As well, the tool provides valuable details on open rates and usability tracking by monitoring inline clicks. Technically a Salesforce app, the tool also makes communication around campaigns and promotions easier, and provides a personal touch that is the hallmark of Inspirato’s service to their members.